


A Blossoming Sickness

by Tommykaine



Category: Original Work
Genre: Age Difference, Angst, Hanahaki Disease, Introspection, M/M, No Sex, No Underage Sex, Original Slash, Pedophilia, copying and reposting this work elsewhere without my permission is strictly forbidden!
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-21
Updated: 2019-08-21
Packaged: 2020-09-23 11:01:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,435
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20339041
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tommykaine/pseuds/Tommykaine
Summary: The first time he saw him was in November.He was carrying a basket full of apples on his way to school. His backpack was a bright red colour, much like his soft, round cheeks.He only saw him by chance, outside of the main entrance, but their eyes crossed for a second.He had beautiful blue eyes.Anton felt a sudden sharp pain in his chest, his hand clenching on the books he was carrying before he could drop them.The boy hurried inside, his ears bright red.That was how the first seed had taken root.





	A Blossoming Sickness

The first time he saw him was in November.

He was carrying a basket full of apples on his way to school. His backpack was a bright red colour, much like his soft, round cheeks.

He only saw him by chance, outside of the main entrance, but their eyes crossed for a second.

He had beautiful blue eyes.

Anton felt a sudden sharp pain in his chest, his hand clenching on the books he was carrying before he could drop them.

The boy hurried inside, his ears bright red.

That was how the first seed had taken root.

Emile. His name was Emile.

Fate brought him to Anton on a Saturday afternoon, dressed in the guise of his mother asking him to watch over him for a few hours.

Anton looked down at him, those big blue eyes staring up in a mixture of fear and curiosity. He tightened his grasp on the cup of tea he was holding, keeping his hands busy so they could not wander and, for example, find out if those brown curls were as soft as they looked.

His mother left them alone. Anton cleared his throat, invited him upstairs.

Emile softly nodded and reached out to take his hand.

A small vine sprouted out from the seed in his chest, wrapping its tendrils around his heart.

This was how the affliction would spread through him.

Emile was a quiet boy. Quiet, yet attentive. He listened more than spoke whenever he was left with Anton, his big blue eyes never leaving his.

Apparently he was the son of a family acquaintance, his own mother often too busy to keep an eye on him.

Those afternoon were both a blessing and a torture. His small hand, his soft-looking curls, his slightly curved back, all close enough for him to touch, while fully knowing that he couldn't.

His soft lips pushed against the red apples he always brought as a snack, some of the juice and small bits of fruit lingering on the edge of his bottom lip before he realized it and licked it off.

The tendrils were multiplying, slowly but surely enveloping his heart, sometimes squeezing it so hard he was sure it would stop beating.

He was in his fourth year of high school and yet he felt like his body was already on the verge of collapsing.

When Summer came, Anton's mother started bringing them both to the sea.

Emile smiled at him, clad in nothing but a small pair of bright red shorts. His bright blue eyes looking up at him as he waited for him to rub the sunscreen on his pale skin.

His throat clenched and his hands shook, sure that someone up there would punish him for daring to brush that soft skin even with the tip of a finger, sure that it had to be some kind of trap set for him to betray himself.

The vines slithered through his lungs, squeezing the breath out of him. Yet, as his trembling hands finished the task, Emile only smiled again and thanked him before getting up and urging him to come help him pick up some seashells.

The vines were starting to flower. Dark flowers of evil. Small, harmless-looking flowers that hid a dark secret that no one else could know.

On those days, those lazy Summer afternoons, Anton learned to lie to himself.

Anton told himself that if his hands would linger a moment more it was only as a precaution, only to make sure he hadn't missed any spot.

Hidden in plain sight.

The vines would soon grow thorns, hard enough to pierce through his flesh, but for now they were little more than soft, needle-thin pricklers, harmless and unnoticed.

Just like his small lies.

Emile liked to catch crabs. He was fearless, at least until one of them managed to catch his finger with its pinchers, causing him to throw it away and run back to Anton, holding onto him and hiding his face against his stomach to hide his tears.

Anton didn't say a word, neither to mock him nor to encourage him, but his hand softly moved through his curls, carefully and slowly, as if he was scared to ruin it.

He would never do anything to ruin the ray of light into his life, the reason he struggled to breathe when he wasn't around, the vines slithering down, twisting and writhing around in his stomach.

He would never dare to do anything that would cause him to lose that small hand searching for his, squeezing his fingers tightly as Emile dragged him forward, searching for more crabs to hunt.

Emile's grandmother lived in the countryside, growing vegetables in a big orchard.

Anton started to come by and lend her a hand, in exchange for some pocket money. She was old and struggled to pick up the vegetables with her bad back, not to mention tearing out the weeds and planting new seeds.

Emile would claim to want to help too, but he mostly got distracted chasing small lizards or butterflies, or eating peas and strawberries straight from the plants when he thought Anton wasn't looking.

Anton didn't mind. His presence was enough to make his tasks seem lighter. As long as he could bask in the sight of his sun-kissed cheeks covered with freckles, of his small limbs grasping on his shirt as he picked him up and spinned around until they both fell down laughing.

He could almost forget about the vines spreading through his body, at least until he overheard the old woman speak with Emile's mother.

“Isn't he a bit too old to be hanging out with Emile?”.

The thorns started biting into his insides, his whole body spasming as he clenched his fists and gritted his teeth to hold back a pained cry.

He was in his last year of high school and he already felt as if his love would kill him.

Emile was attending middle school, his small limbs growing longer and his skin burdened by a few pimples. Still, even then he was the most beautiful thing Anton had ever seen in his life.

He still stopped by his place often, his mother once thanking Anton for looking after him, telling him he didn't have many other friends.

Anton smiled as the thorns were pushed in further, smiled as the sense of guilt helped the roots spread all through his body, making sure there would be no way to eradicate the growth.

Emile would sit down next to him, close enough for their legs to touch as he asked him for help with his homework.

Anton was going to university. He too had trouble making friends. Maybe because he feared one of them would recognize the smell that permeated him, would be able to sense the subtle movements of the vines underneath his skin.

Emile moved in closer, his hand lightly brushing Anton's leg, and for a second he could not breathe.

The tendrils squeezed on his lungs as the other's blue eyes glanced up at him, his cheeks flushed red, his rosy lips slightly parting as he pushed them against Anton's.

The blossoming flowers hurt, the petals filling his lungs and for a moment he held on to the boy's shoulders.

For a moment, he wanted it to spread through him, to infect Emile so he would be the same as him, so that the vines would intertwine their bodies together until no one else would be able to pull them apart.

But then Anton felt the pain of the thorns and pushed him away, getting up and running outside, wishing it would rain to cover up the tears streaking down his face.

He never saw Emile after that. He refused to.

Sometimes, he still thought of him.When the vines kept twisting and turning inside him, ravaging his body as they screamed at him to let them out, to let the flowers spread in full bloom.

He was hoping that, with enough time, they would surely wither and die. Free him from his dreadful infection.

Over time, he learned to live with it. Or rather, survive.

Sometimes he saw a little speck of him in someone's blue eyes, in the cheerful smile and the light blush of a pair of soft round cheeks, in the small hands that he would long to touch, even just once.

But then he thought of Emile, and he knew he would sooner let himself be poisoned, he would soon let himself rot than let the disease spread to him, or anyone like him.


End file.
